Barnett v. State

• Decision Date: 23 June 2022
• Docket Number: M2021-00554-CCA-R3-PC
• Parties: ANTHONY E. BARNETT v. STATE OF TENNESSEE NASHVILLE
• Court: Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals

ANTHONY E. BARNETT
v.
STATE OF TENNESSEE NASHVILLE

No. M2021-00554-CCA-R3-PC

Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee, Nashville

June 23, 2022

Assigned on Briefs June 21, 2022

Appeal from the Circuit Court for Lawrence County No. 36370 Christopher V. Sockwell, Judge

The petitioner, Anthony E. Barnett, appeals the dismissal of his petition for post-conviction relief as untimely. Because the record establishes that the incarcerated petitioner did not submit his petition to the appropriate prison official for mailing within one year of the final action of the supreme court on his direct appeal, we affirm the ruling of the post-conviction court.

Tenn. R. App. P. 3; Judgment of the Circuit Court Affirmed

Ben Bush, Summertown, Tennessee, for the appellant, Anthony E. Barnett.

Herbert H. Slatery III, Attorney General and Reporter; T. Austin Watkins, Assistant Attorney General; Brent Cooper, District Attorney General; and Christi L. Thompson, Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

JAMES CURWOOD WITT, JR., J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which ROBERT W. WEDEMEYER, and J. ROSS DYER, JJ., joined.

OPINION

JAMES CURWOOD WITT, JR., JUDGE

In April 2017, a Lawrence County Circuit Court Jury convicted the petitioner of possession with intent to sell alprazolam, possession of a firearm with the intent to go armed during the commission of a dangerous felony, simple possession of marijuana, and speeding, and this court affirmed the convictions and accompanying five-year sentence on direct appeal. See State v. Anthony Eugene Barnett, No. M2017-02317-CCA-R3-CD, 2019 WL 1057386 (Tenn. Crim. App., Nashville, Mar. 6, 2019). This court summarized the evidence adduced at trial in its analysis of the sufficiency of the convicting evidence:

The evidence adduced at trial established that, upon stopping the defendant for speeding, Trooper [Jeremy] Miller

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observed a baggy containing marijuana and pills in the floorboard of the defendant's truck. Trooper Miller seized the baggy, and TBI testing established that the pills were alprazolam. In addition to the marijuana and pills Trooper Miller seized from the defendant's person nearly $5,000 in cash, a firearm, and a notebook that . . . could have been a ledger. The defendant had no prescription for the pills. Although Ms. [Lorrie] Pewitt testified that the drugs belonged to her, the jury was free to reject this testimony

. . . Trooper Miller recovered a firearm from the defendant's person. Mr. [Daniel] Hunt, the original owner of the weapon, testified that it was a Springfield Armory 1911 .45 pistol. Contrary to the defendant's assertion, the statute does not require a showing that the gun could fire but only requires a showing that it was "designed, made or adapted to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive or any device readily convertible to that use." Id. § 39-11-106(11). The gun in this case clearly satisfied that requirement....

Id., 2019 WL 1057386, at *4. Our supreme court denied the petitioner's application for permission to appeal...